53-56, CHARLOTTE ROAD B3

A group of four stucco villas, numbers 53 to 56 Charlotte Road, was built around 1830 to 1840 in Edgbaston. Originally identical, each villa has three bays and two storeys. The facades feature a plinth, channelled stucco to the ground floor up to the moulded first-floor sill course, and Tuscan quoin pilasters. The central bay on the first floor is also flanked by Tuscan pilasters rising from a doorway entablature. A deep frieze breaks back over the central bay. The gable-ended slate roof has bed mould to the overhanging eaves, and corniced brick chimneys. The first-floor windows are plain revealed, with panelled sills. The ground-floor windows are set in camber-arched panels with grooved voussoirs. Broad pilaster strip doorways have consoles supporting a moulded cornice. Each doorway has a two-panelled door with a narrow rectangular fanlight and marginal side lights. The first-floor windows retain their original glazing bars. Numbers 54 and 55 have had their ground-floor windows replaced with circa 1860 canted bay windows with cornices.